New York Times columnist David Brooks ignored the actual proposals that Mitt Romney and Rep. Paul Ryan have for Medicare to claim that their plan "would not shift costs to seniors."

Brooks wrote[1]: "Whenever you hear a Democrat say that Romney and Ryan would end Medicare or cost seniors $6,000, that is a misleading reference to the original Ryan plan, not anything on offer today. Today's Romney plan would not shift costs to seniors." Brooks later added "The Romney-Ryan approach might work. If it doesn't, the federal budget would suffer but seniors wouldn't."

In fact, Romney and Ryan plan to repeal[2] the Affordable Care Act and transform Medicare into a voucher system[3], and it's clear that such a plan will cost seniors money.

The Affordable Care Act provides money to help seniors pay for their prescription drugs. The Medicare prescription drug benefit passed under President George W. Bush created a "donut hole[4]" that required seniors with high prescription drug costs to pay thousands of dollars. The Affordable Care Act closed that donut hole.

According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities[5], this provision of the Affordable Care Act has saved seniors $3.2 billion already. If the Romney-Ryan plan is enacted and the ACA is repealed, seniors would have to pay that money again.

Numerous independent experts have also said[6] that Ryan's plan to transform Medicare into a voucher system will force seniors to spend millions more for health care because the vouchers would not keep pace with rising health care costs. Indeed, Yale public policy professor Ted Marmor has said[7] that under the Ryan plan, some seniors would be forced to "choose between paying for better coverage and having more money for food and other items."